A Road of Humility Toward Reconciliation

The United Church of Canada carries a real weight of history because it helped run fifteen Indian residential schools on behalf of the Canadian government. The church has made apologies, paid compensation through the Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement, and continues to support the Healing Fund and Justice and Reconciliation Fund. Reconciliation, though, is not something that gets finished. An apology is only the first step, and the road calls congregations to learn the truth about colonization, residential schools, and the harm done in the name of Christianity.

The Mohawk Institute makes that history painfully real. Canada’s longest running residential school operated from 1828 to 1970, drawing fifteen thousand Indigenous children from many communities. The building looks bright and renovated now, but the stories held inside point to cold dormitories, poor food, forced farm labour, isolation from family, punishment, and abuse. The children called it the “mush hole” because thin, watered down mush was their regular breakfast, while food they grew was sold to help run the school.

The underside of a sewing table bears the names children scratched where nobody could see. That small hidden witness says that children were there, that they mattered, and that their presence could not be completely erased. The locked closet beneath the stairs, the laundry and boiler rooms, and the silenced reports of concern reveal how long injustice can continue when people turn away, file away the truth, or decide that change costs too much.

The church’s failure came from a faith tangled up with colonization, Christianization, and assimilation. Arrogance imagined that Indigenous peoples needed to be remade into Western culture, and that arrogance blinded people to terrible harm. Humility calls Christians to keep examining how faith is lived, to be open to correction, and to allow truth to change them.

The Ten Commandments offer a different way forward. God gave these words to people coming out of slavery, teaching them how to live freely and in harmony with God and neighbour. The commandments reject false gods, violence, stealing, lies, and coveting because love for God cannot be separated from love for neighbour. The Mohawk Institute now stands, like the resurrected Christ, with scars. God can transform a place of desecration into a sacred place of education, justice, and healing.

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Key Takeaways

• 1. Reconciliation never reaches a finish line. Reconciliation requires more than a statement of regret or a financial settlement. The work continues as churches learn the truth, hear survivors, and face their own history without defensiveness. Humility remains necessary because the damage of residential schools did not end when the schools closed. [40:27]
• 2. Hidden names bear witness to dignity. The names scratched under the sewing table show children refusing to disappear completely inside an institution built to erase identity. That hidden writing becomes a quiet act of witness: these children were there, and their stories matter. Remembering their names resists the old habit of treating suffering as a forgotten file. [47:29]
• 3. Faith can become entangled with arrogance. Christianity becomes distorted when it joins itself to control, superiority, and the desire to remake another people. The goal of colonizing and assimilating Indigenous children revealed a deep failure to see neighbours as fully human and beloved by God. Faith needs continual correction when it serves power instead of love. [50:11]
• 4. Love of God requires neighbourly justice. The commandments join devotion to God with truthful, humane relationships toward other people. Worship cannot be separated from refusing violence, lies, theft, and disregard for a neighbour’s life. The road toward reconciliation is part of loving God because it seeks to treat neighbours with respect.
  
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Youtube Chapters

• [00:00] - Welcome
• [34:17] - A Gentle Warning and Shared History
• [36:52] - Apologies, Compensation, and Healing Funds
• [39:24] - Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action
• [40:44] - Visiting the Mohawk Institute
• [42:53] - Inside Canada’s Longest Running Residential School
• [45:02] - The “Mush Hole” and Daily Injustice
• [46:14] - Abuse, Isolation, and Silenced Children
• [47:29] - Names Written Beneath the Sewing Table
• [49:10] - Questions the Church Must Face
• [51:20] - The Ten Commandments and Loving Neighbours
• [54:37] - Scars, Education, Justice, and Healing

Bible Reading

Exodus 20:1-17
“And God spoke all these words, saying, "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.” [31:16]

Matthew 22:37-40
“And he said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” [53:06]

Luke 24:36-40
“As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, "Peace to you!" But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit. And he said to them, "Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet.” [54:53]

Observation questions

1. In Exodus 20, what two kinds of relationships are addressed by the commandments: relationship with God and relationship with other people? [52:04]
2. What examples of daily injustice at the Mohawk Institute show that children’s basic needs and dignity were not protected? [45:02]
3. What did the names written beneath the sewing table reveal about the children who lived at the school? [48:24]
4. According to Matthew 22, how does Jesus connect wholehearted love for God with love for one’s neighbour? [53:06]

Interpretation questions

1. Exodus presents the commandments as guidance given to people emerging from slavery. How might commandments against violence, stealing, and false witness protect people who are vulnerable or whose voices are easily ignored? [51:33]
2. What does the hidden writing of children’s names suggest about the human need to be seen, remembered, and treated as someone who matters? [47:35]
3. How can a community’s desire to control, “improve,” or remake another people become a false god that replaces humility and love of neighbour? [50:18]
4. In Luke 24, the risen Jesus still bears wounds. What does this image suggest about truthful healing that does not hide or erase the scars of past harm? [54:53]

Application questions

1. Reconciliation is a continuing road rather than a task that can be completed. What is one concrete way each person in the group could keep learning about residential schools, local Indigenous communities, or the Calls to Action? [40:27]
2. The children’s hidden names remind us that people can be overlooked, silenced, or reduced to a problem. Who in our community may need to be listened to more carefully, and what might respectful listening look like this week? [48:24]
3. Humility includes being open to correction and change. When has someone helped you recognize a blind spot in your attitudes, assumptions, or actions? What made it easier or harder to receive that correction? [51:04]
4. Love for God cannot be separated from love for neighbour. Which part of the commandments—truthfulness, respect for life, refusing to take what belongs to another, or resisting envy—feels especially important in your relationships right now? [52:41]
5. When reports of harm are ignored because change seems costly or inconvenient, injustice can continue. What are some gentle and responsible ways a church community can take concerns seriously rather than looking away? [49:39]
6. The Mohawk Institute is now a place of education, justice, and healing while still bearing the reality of its history. Where have you seen truthfully remembered pain become an opportunity for healing or more faithful action? [54:49]